


Any Other Virtue

by Callmesalticidae



Series: There is Nothing to Fear [11]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Hogwarts House Sorting, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen, Gryffindor Tom Riddle, Hogwarts House Sorting Ceremony, Hostage Situations, Sword of Gryffindor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-08
Updated: 2020-10-08
Packaged: 2021-03-08 03:35:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,460
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26888980
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Callmesalticidae/pseuds/Callmesalticidae
Summary: A Weasley is heading to his first year at Hogwarts. There is nothing to fear. (1982)
Series: There is Nothing to Fear [11]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1087368
Comments: 15
Kudos: 46





	Any Other Virtue

> Without courage we cannot practice any other virtue with consistency.
> 
> Maya Angelou

When the train finally sputtered and roared to life, and the platform began to crawl and then race away in the window, Bill Weasley released a sigh of relief. His mother almost hadn’t let him go to Hogwarts, and there had even been talk of not opening the school at all. The _Prophet_ had added an extra page all this summer just for folks to argue it back and forth in the “Letters” section.

For just as long, Bill had been woken up once a week to the sound of his parents arguing, in the bedroom or the kitchen or even outside—he didn’t leave his window open anymore after that one. Percy, at least, could be counted on to stay quiet, and the twins and Ron could be shushed to sleep, but Charlie was inconsolable sometimes. Bill hoped, for all their sakes but especially Charlie’s, that fighting in the Burrow would die down now that the decision had been made.

If only the fighting in the rest of Britain could be ended so quickly. Despite himself, despite every assurance his father had given, and the brave face he’d put on—”Such a Gryffindor!” his mother had whispered, though he didn’t know whether it was meant for him or to reassure herself—it was still an anxious trip.

Hogwarts was the safest place in Britain. That’s what sealed it, in the end, but the train wasn’t Hogwarts, just how you got there, and someone, somewhere, had started a rumor that the Death Eaters might hit the Hogwarts Express. It was nothing, it _had_ to be nothing, because if something went wrong then Bill might never be allowed to go to Hogwarts again, but he didn’t fully relax until the boats came into view.

“Riddle isn’t going to kill _children_ ,” was his father’s view. “He can’t assault _Hogwarts_ ,” was his mother’s, who disagreed on what Riddle might find palatable or practical, but didn’t think it could happen there, up in Scotland where Dumbledore and the protective enchantments of a thousand years still held strong.

Now he was here. Now he was safe.

Somewhere, deep enough to be faint, close enough that he still felt, Bill felt something, a sort of future-phantom pain, homesickness-yet-to-be-realized. To see the castle like this, enormous and magnificent, reminded him at once that _this_ would be his home now, for so much longer than he’d ever been away from the Burrow before. The way things were, he probably wouldn’t come home for Christmas.

_The way things were_. That’s what his father had whispered a few days ago, when his parents had stopped fighting for the night and they thought everyone was sound asleep again: _the way things were_ …

Well, he might not come home for summer, either.

It wasn’t out there, not yet, but Dumbledore was considering it, and Minister Bagnold was agreeable enough that even Bill’s father had heard rumors that the Ministry was entertaining the possibility.

This was it, then: home, for a year and maybe longer.

One of the professors exited first, then students were called to assemble outside by year and house: “Seventh Years, Gryffindor!” and then “Hufflepuff!” and so on in alphabetical order, winding down until at last the Second-Year Slytherins disembarked.

There were no houses for the First Years to organize themselves into, however. Idly, Bill amused himself with the observation that, having not been Sorted, they could not be sorted. The professors had thought of that, however, and the aurors were going up and down the train to retrieve children by name. By the time one finally returned for Bill (the aurors had come by twice before, for Conall Doge and Myron Wagtail) and they went outside, the older students were already gone and everyone left had been gathered into little groups, each one beside a boat.

Bill stepped out first, and then the auror, and Professor McGonagall last of all. He wondered whether the trolley lady was going to get out too, but instead all the aurors returned the train and that seemed to be the end of it, leaving only Professors McGonagall and Kettleburn, who notably had just three arms between them, and a new, portly man who identified himself as “the groundskeeper, Mr. Weatherby.”

The three of them conducted everyone to their boats and thereafter across the lake. There was a squid down there in the depths, or so Bill’s parents had told him, but not a single boat was ensnared in its tentacles and taken down to the water's bottom. Bill was a little disappointed, especially since he was sure that the adults could keep anything seriously bad from happening, but his mother would probably still be worried if she caught word of a thing like that, so in the end it was probably for the best.

McGonagall had taken a place in Bill’s boat, since he had arrived last of all and the boats had been filled alphabetically. This meant that she was still close to him after they arrived on the other side of the lake and resumed walking, and he was in a good position to see a scowl grow on her face as they reached the Great Hall.

“Has Lucius still not arrived?” she muttered to another professor, who was standing at the threshold. “It’s the Sorting. I would expect someone so concerned with tradition to actually _be here_.”

“Probably absorbed in that carpentry project of his,” the other said.

“At least he shows up to classes,” McGonagall replied, and then, perhaps noticing that Bill was still there, she waved him along to where the other First Years were sitting. Again, he was last, so all the good seats had been taken, but with his back to the wall and all attention on the Sorting Hat, there was nobody to call him out for standing in order to get a good view. Some of the others in the back row followed his lead.

The Sorting commenced, and Bill wondered whether it really was taking as long as it felt, or if that was just his impatience. Eventually, after minutes or an hour or several eons, Myron Wagtail had been sorted (“Ravenclaw!”) and Bill was finally ready, the Sorting Hat just inches from his head, when someone entered the Great Hall. The man’s robes were very fine, better than anything Bill had really imagined anyone could have. There was something odd about his face, like it was all screwed up too tight or he was trying to hold in a yelp after getting hurt.

“I m-must inform you that we are about to have a visitor,” he said. “He requests that I tell you...th-that he means no harm, but there is a, a protective enchantment—cast for _your_ sake—which he can break with a moment’s thought, and which will also break if he is killed or incapacitated.”

Kettleburn stood up, gesturing with his arm-stump. “Professor Malfoy, what is the meaning of—”

He was cut off by the smooth entry of an enormous serpent, whose presence seemed to dwarf the Great Hall itself—for the Great Hall was meant to be large, but Bill had never seen a snake that was even a hundredth the size of this one. Children, and not a few professors, screamed, and many turned their eyes away, but Bill knew it didn’t matter: the basilisk was blindfolded.

Close at its figurative heels, or perhaps its coils, came a second man. His robes were humbler than Professor Malfoy’s, plain and utilitarian. He held a wand in either hand, and the sound of his heavy, black boots seemed to echo through the chamber.

Bill had seen pictures, of course, photographs from old issues of the _Prophet_ , but even if he hadn’t, he would have known who it was.

“Hogwarts, Hogwarts, Hoggy Warty Hogwarts,” Riddle sang softly, as the basilisk began to circle the room. His voice carried through the silence so, for all that he seemed to be whispering, Bill could hear him, clear as anything. His eyes were half-closed, and his head swayed slowly from side to side, in tune with the words. Then Riddle’s eyes snapped open, red and close to glowing, and the Great Hall seemed to freeze as though he himself were a basilisk.

Step by step, Riddle advanced through the Great Hall, walking with the Slytherin table to his right and the wall closest to the entrance on his left. Then, close to the High Table, Riddle turned and Bill realized, with a feeling of terror that rose up from his gut, that Riddle was looking straight at him.

“You look familiar,” Riddle said, and he came closer. Behind Bill, there was movement at the High Table, but with his free hand Riddle tapped the side of his head, close to his eyes, and everything stopped. There was a basilisk present. What could they do? Finally, Riddle reached Bill. The man pressed a couple of fingers against his cheek as if in thought. “You’re a son of the Weasleys, aren’t you? Yes. One of your uncles nearly took a chunk off my pointer finger this summer,” Riddle said, lifting up the digit in question. He knelt down till he was eye to eye with Bill. “What’s your first name, young Weasley?”

“B-B-Bill.” Was it possible to die of fright at eleven? That was just for old folks, right? Right?

“Well, B-B-Bill, I think that I interrupted your Sorting. Awful timing, that, but such things will occur from time to time. I would be awfully interested to know where you will end up. One’s House will always have a tremendous effect on how one turns out. Trust me, I should know.” Riddle’s mouth broke open into a smile. “They say that the House of Gryffindor has lost its good name these past few years, but surely you don’t agree with those naysayers…”

“Now see here, Tom!” shouted the hat, but Riddle cast a wordless Silencing Charm before it could get any further.

The wizard maintained his grin. “Forget that old cap. It always listens to you in the end, so tell me, Bill, which House do _you_ want to go to?”

_Anything but Gryffindor, anything but Gryffindor, anything, anything, anything…_

“You’re afraid of me, Bill. Did you know that _I_ was afraid once? But then the Sorting Hat showed that fear to me, told me how it would hurt me in the years to come, and I…found its argument persuasive. I became a Gryffindor that day, and I learned to conquer my fears. And now?” Riddle looked out over the Great Hall, its occupants silent as death, before his gaze returned to Bill. “I _am_ fear.”

_He’ll kill me. He’ll hurt my family. He, he might get mad if I don’t say Gryffindor, maybe even kill_ everyone _here. He…_

Bill swallowed. He could hear the soft, slithering rattle of the basilisk moving, circling the room. He could almost hear it breathing.

_He’s a monster. And I don’t want to be anything like him._

Suddenly, it seemed unthinkable that Bill could join that house, that man’s house. It felt corrupt already, like there was something he could _catch_ , if he just laid down in the beds, or even stayed this close to Riddle for much longer.

Well, he was friendly with Myron, wasn’t he? And he liked books, and he was clever, or so grown-ups told him, and those were the qualities that everyone said were most important for the blue and silver.

Somewhere in the tables, someone whimpered as the circling basilisk drew near. They were swiftly hushed.

Riddle’s eyes bore down on him.

Not Slytherin, not that den of snakes, almost as sick and twisted up as Gryffindor looked to him right now. Not Hufflepuff, really, for all that they were kind, for all it might guarantee that Riddle would never think of him again, might just be disappointed, or scornful, not angry, he just _couldn’t_.

There was only one choice, really, one place where he’d feel at home, if he couldn’t feel that way anymore about the house his father and _his_ father, on and on, had gone to.

“R-Ravenclaw,” Bill said, surprised that he had been able to say the word, and the air turned tense as everyone waited for Riddle’s response.

“I see,” said Riddle, and then he smiled in a sad sort of way, the ends of his mouth curling up just a little and not really connecting to his eyes. “Oh, you would have done _well_ in Gryffindor.” He made a movement with his wand, and Bill flinched, but Riddle only levitated the Sorting Hat from off his head.

Riddle looked at it for a long moment, then flipped it upside-down with another wand movement, thrust his other hand inside, and slowly withdrew a long, silver sword with a hilt insetted with rubies. As he lifted it partway in the air there were cries of disbelief from all around the Great Hall, not least from the High Table.

“That’s impossible!” McGonagall shouted. “This is a trick. You are a disgrace to Gryffindor. You have brought nothing but shame and ruin to Godric’s House. You cannot be worthy—”

“I am worthy,” Riddle said with quiet firmness. “On what account am I _unfit_ for the House of Gryffindor? Have I not demonstrated great courage? Have I not displayed unyielding determination? Do you think I am not strong of heart? I assure you, my will is stronger than the finest steel. Do not be deluded,” he said, so quietly that perhaps only Bill could hear, “into thinking that I have not purified myself.”

Riddle circled the High Table till he was near the middle again, this time on the opposite side from Bill. With a gesture of his wand he drew back the single empty chair there—the Headmaster’s chair.

There was silence for a few seconds, then he spoke again, this time to Professor Malfoy, who was still standing at the entrance to the Great Hall. “Go, now, Lucius, and inform them of what has happened. Tell them that I have gained entrance to Hogwarts. Tell them that I am here, with their children, and that I am accompanied by a basilisk. Tell them all this, and one thing more: Albus Dumbledore, and only Albus Dumbledore, will be permitted to enter Hogwarts. It is time that he and I have finished the issue between us, and then he or I will handle whatever comes next, but if anyone but Dumbledore enters this castle then I will loose the basilisk and everyone here will die.”

Lucius bowed, and Riddle sat down in the Headmaster’s chair for the first time.

**Author's Note:**

> The working title for this story was "Anything but Gryffindor."
> 
> (Yes, Lucius did just stab everybody in the back with the vanishing cabinet. Riddle started work on repairing it when he was at Hogwarts, but graduated before the job could be finished.)


End file.
